Saturday, December 11, 2010

Pinned Down

 I'm sitting on the cusp of Libra and Virgo, which puts me at risk of an astrological wedgie. But really I'm a Libra through and through. I hold the balances; I see both sides of an issue. I don't like to get pinned down. In spite of that, I just went in for my annual mammogram.

In the interest of my health, I have my annual mammogram every fifteen months or so. Fifteen-month years do wonders for your longevity. This time, after taking the required four pictures, they asked for a do-over. They said I moved. What moving? There's no moving. If the fire alarm goes off, I'm screwed. Nothing pins a girl down like a mammogram.

The woman in charge (let's call her Adolph) carefully stuffs your breast onto the bottom plate, hauling in a little extra from the belly, armpit and the lowermost of chins, and then takes the top plate and smashes you to a thickness that she can read through. The instructions are on the bottom plate.

This used to be more painful, but as one obtains maturity, as here defined by a marked decrease in sexual attractiveness, one's breasts begin to lose all their internal architecture, replacing it with a sort of apathetic goo. In the context of a mammogram, the procedure now involves less stuffing and cramming than merely peeling the tissue off the torso like a piecrust and rolling it out onto the plate. The top plate is now superfluous.

One year I got a letter afterwards suggesting I should come back in for a recheck. There was an "anomaly," and a date available in two weeks. I'm not the sort of person who can survive two weeks in a state of panic, so I badgered them until they admitted they weren't really doing anything just then, just sitting around eating pancakes and pita bread and playing with their food, and I raced in. The technician brought out my x-ray and hung it up on the wall for reference.

What these pictures used to look like, pre-menopause, with all the architecture intact, was something you might see from the Hubble telescope: millions of little stars and thready gases and nebulae, in which trained personnel can detect suspicious planets. I'd seen one of mine before. This one was deep space, all darkness, no nebulae at all, with the Star of Bethlehem blazing away right in the middle. I could see it from across the room. "Is that thing in the middle the anomaly we're looking at?" I whimpered, visualizing a tiny tumor glowing in a manger. The technician nodded. She used a more focused x-ray machine and zeroed in on my supernova. Then she left the room with the x-ray to show the doctor,  leaving me with an inadequately distracting group of women's magazines. At times like these, one is no longer interested in how to keep pounds off during the holidays, or five new recipes for fried chocolate.

Adolph isn't allowed to tell you anything about your x-rays, even though you suspect she knows as much as the doctors do. She came back in and apologized that she needed to take a few more shots. Fifteen minutes later she came back and said she needed to escort me to stage two, Ultrasound.

By the time we'd reached the Ultrasound room, I had run through a number of items that needed changing in my will, and while she was consulting the doctor about the new results, I'd begun a preliminary list of music I thought would be nice for my funeral. She returned to accompany me and my breasts to stage three, a stern interrogation. The doctor had my old x-ray, the one with the big star, hung up next to a series of new ones, which were entirely blank. "As you can see," he said, using the pointer, "we can't find the anomaly anymore. We probably got a little pleat in there the first time. You don't seem to have anything in your breasts at all. You're good to go."

Nothing in them at all. I gave them an affectionate little pat, without taking my hands from my lap.

49 comments:

  1. This is a genius post - hilarious and touching all at the same time. "the procedure now involves less stuffing and cramming than merely peeling the tissue off the torso like a piecrust and rolling it out onto the plate." Har! And the last line is classic. Brilliantly written. I'm glad your goo is good to go. :)

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  2. So good, so true, so well written. Thanks for a grin at your expense - I'll remember this next time I go (in a big truck, parked outside the local hospital, staffed by a grim -faced woman with a moustache last time!

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  3. I picture you sitting there waiting for each stage, struggling to figure out how the hell you were going to turn that torture into humor. In truth, it's the mundane that doesn't convert so easily; the monumental goes from ridiculous to sublime in no time flat. Pun unavoidable.

    With this post, you do great service to womankind. I'm due for a mammogram, myself, and, thanks to you, I won't be able to get through it without giggling.

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  4. Well, now, I hadn't thought of my mammograms as STAR worthy...but, you convinced me. Yes, supernovas and all--been there. Especially the smooshed flat can't move part.
    Normally, I like to chat up folks, but whilst being smooshed, I try not to chat--on account of I don't want to technician to forget what she's doing and leave me breathless, as it were.
    You do know, don't you, that mammograms are one of the circles of hell Dante envisioned?

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  5. I hate mammograms but go because my mother had breast cancer twice. Every single time, they see something suspicious, re-do the mammogram and then do an ultrasound. I remember looking at the mammogram and thinking my breast looked like a moon on the screen - mostly white with some dark gray bits.

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  6. This is priceless. When I realized you took that second picture in the doctor's office with camera in hand, I laughed out loud. Good news, that's for sure. Little pleat?? Twice? Where do they come up with these explanations?

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  7. Haha, been there, done that. Had an anomaly myself this year. It turns out that mine was "a bit of folded tissue." I like the term "pleat" better, it sounds classier.

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  8. It's so depressing to realize the bags are empty and can now BE pleated.

    One of my friends died a few years ago.

    Immediately after her initial diagnosis, she sent an email to every woman she knew, saying, "GO. Now. Get a mammogram."

    Because she had put it off and put it off and put it off... even though she knew there was something that needed to be checked out.

    We will never know if an early mammogram would have saved her life.

    But I went. And I go every year because of her.

    Right after she sent the email, she sent out the one you may have seen about how a person lies on the concrete floor of a garage, they stick a piece of plywood on top of your boob, come park a truck on it and then take photos.

    Bubba's Mammogram Store, I think.

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  9. Tooooo funny! Another great post - gave me a laugh on a gray day. Now that you have reminded me, I'm somewhat overdue too - my "year" consists of 24+ months!!! Seriously, I can sympathize, having received a certified letter once asking me to make another appointment - I about had a heart attack then, running to the phone to make that appointment! Mine turned out to be nothing, too, but still . . . Glad you will survive to write another day!

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  10. Seriously? A little PLEAT? Aaaaaand thank you for the heart attack, x-ray guy.

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  11. I am so glad to know that I am not the only one ready to rewrite my will at a moment's notice.
    Doesn't your facility do the side views? I shudder at that phase, muster all the strength I can remember from days' climbing the jungle gym on the playground, and hang on for dear life.
    The platform begins to pivot, I feel my left foot lift from the floor,....

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  12. I had the SAME dog & pony show this year - except that I'm not menopausal yet (as far as I know. My husband might tell you differently). I had two "nodules" to check out. They decided that they were just cysts.

    I went through the same thought process you did - although I also added in wondering what I would look like with no hair.

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  13. What music did you come up with?

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  14. Yep. I've seen that movie too, although my verbage was a lot less elegant than yours! It used to be "routine" for the tech to call me back in for an ultrasound because I had "dense, fatty tissue." Several years ago, the facility I go to upgraded its equipment to Digital Images. I hope the new machines are making their way toward your side of the country, because I've not required a follow up or an ultrasound since! I still hear the shark's theme song from the soundtrack to "Jaws" though when I'm in the vise-like grip of the device. Elaine

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  15. Hoo boy, ain't it somethin' how your head zooms right to the embalming chamber?
    By now you're just thanking your lucky stars for the thorough medical care. Me too, although from now on my mammograms will only take half the time that they used to. :-p

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  16. ...and I thought getting a vasectomy was traumatic.

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  17. My gosh! I thought I was the only one that would have the memorial service completely planned and then wondering if Jerry would remarry... Mary this is a keeper! thank you from me in Eugene!

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  18. A classic. How did you get the supernova shots? Did they give them to you, or did you photograph the X-ray while it was on the screen? If the latter, I commend you for your journalistic curiosity. I would not have been able to shoot a picture from a fetal position.

    xoxox
    jz

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  19. Well, a girl's gotta laugh at life, right?
    Seriously...humour does help.

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  20. I'm rolling up on my 19 month year since the last mammo. Girl you have got it down... squish-squash and you're taking a bath - in sweat which is forced out by having your breasts assaulted legally. (See why my years grow longer?) Okay. If Murrrrr can do it, I can too. Thanks, gf.

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  21. Maybe I should take a camera to my next mammosquash. That is, if I ever make an appointment.

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  22. As the late and much-lamented St. Molly Ivins said, Get. The. Damn. Mammogram. As for the camera: Adolph refused to participate. She was worried about liability or inadvertent porn or something--no fun at all, unlike my splendid and fearless groinecologist, who took pictures I was unwilling to post.

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  23. Darling, it's not so bad having your boobies in your lap. After my bath today I reached up to wrap my hair in a towel. Got a lovely view of myself. I've seen man-boobs bigger than that. Trying to gather enough material for Adolph to put in the compressor can be quite a chore.

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  24. Hi-LAR-ious!!!! Laughed till I thought I'd pee my pants!

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  25. They are wrong about nothing being "in there"... Hawkings found out that there is 70% dark matter and 30% dark energy. Just don't let a Higgs Bozon in either of those puppies or you can expect a Big Bang.

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  26. In the past, when I had mammograms, the joke was that to practice having them, you needed to lie down on the garage floor and have your husband roll the car over your breasts, or...

    place your breasts in your refrigerator's door, then slam it shut.

    I put my mammos off for three years, then found a lump. Got a mammo and a diagnosis of breast cancer--not the lump, though. That was a cyst, but the mammo showed DCIS in the opposite breast.

    After many biopsies and lumpectomies, I went for the bi-lateral mastectomies, with reconstruction. Whew. It's been 4 years. I'm okay. And the new "girls" are doing just perky, perky fine. When I was asked about what color I'd like the areolae tattoo, I asked for blue. Always wanted blue areolae. But I got pink. No blue.

    Ladies, please, please, please get those mammograms--they saved my life. Don't put them off until you have to ask for blue areolae!

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  27. Wise words, those. Why would they ask what color if they weren't planning to give you what you want, anyway?

    I count four men brave enough to venture here this post, and I'm assuming the rest feared they would be smacked down.

    And Robert the Skeptic, these puppies have gotten me many a big bang.

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  28. I was about to nominate you for the Nobel prize for blogging (WHAT??? Well, why ISN'T there?), and then I got to your comment
    "these puppies have gotten me many a big bang". I will have to reconsider what prize THAT might best qualify you for. Right after I finish cleaning the spit-laden christmas cookie crumbs off my desk, screen and keyboard.

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  29. I'd guess the Ignobel Prize, except there already is one.

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  30. Pancakes and pita bread?! Well, that's just sadistic. At least they weren't chowing down on cantaloupes and watermelons and other perfect specimens of fruithood, though. That would be a little insensitive.

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  31. I think all of us who get regular mammograms can relate -- though few could write about it so hilariously. Thanks for the laugh. The technician who did my last squish-ectomy was actually named Ludmilla and looked like one of those old East German shot putting "women."

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  32. I really don't know what to say here. As usual, I feel like a boob.

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  33. I think I've met Adolph. This reminds me, I'm past 15 months and rounding the corner to 24. Okay. I'll make the appointment -- but only because you make it sound like so much fun.

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  34. Laughter is great medicine and I'm so glad you went...I hurt just reading about the great squisher. But I go, too. Every year. It has saved my life..and it's now 5 years since lumpectomy and radiation. There is so much truth in the statement " the biggest thing we have to fear is fear itself"- Ladies, just do it.

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  35. Well you had me laughing and worrying both in the same blog. And with a holiday theme woven into it!! Good that all is well. :}

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  36. They may not look so good on the outside but don't they have a mysterious beauty on the inside. Great posst.

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  37. They may no longer be so beautiful on the outside but inside they still have a mysterious beauty. Like the rest of their owner. Great post on an important subject.

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  38. They may no longer be so beautiful on the outside but inside they still have a mysterious beauty. Like the rest of their owner. Great post on an important subject.

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  39. Pancakes and pita bread?! Well, that's just sadistic. At least they weren't chowing down on cantaloupes and watermelons and other perfect specimens of fruithood, though. That would be a little insensitive.

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  40. What music did you come up with?

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  41. Seriously? A little PLEAT? Aaaaaand thank you for the heart attack, x-ray guy.

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  42. It's so depressing to realize the bags are empty and can now BE pleated.

    One of my friends died a few years ago.

    Immediately after her initial diagnosis, she sent an email to every woman she knew, saying, "GO. Now. Get a mammogram."

    Because she had put it off and put it off and put it off... even though she knew there was something that needed to be checked out.

    We will never know if an early mammogram would have saved her life.

    But I went. And I go every year because of her.

    Right after she sent the email, she sent out the one you may have seen about how a person lies on the concrete floor of a garage, they stick a piece of plywood on top of your boob, come park a truck on it and then take photos.

    Bubba's Mammogram Store, I think.

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  43. This is priceless. When I realized you took that second picture in the doctor's office with camera in hand, I laughed out loud. Good news, that's for sure. Little pleat?? Twice? Where do they come up with these explanations?

    ReplyDelete
  44. Well, now, I hadn't thought of my mammograms as STAR worthy...but, you convinced me. Yes, supernovas and all--been there. Especially the smooshed flat can't move part.
    Normally, I like to chat up folks, but whilst being smooshed, I try not to chat--on account of I don't want to technician to forget what she's doing and leave me breathless, as it were.
    You do know, don't you, that mammograms are one of the circles of hell Dante envisioned?

    ReplyDelete
  45. I picture you sitting there waiting for each stage, struggling to figure out how the hell you were going to turn that torture into humor. In truth, it's the mundane that doesn't convert so easily; the monumental goes from ridiculous to sublime in no time flat. Pun unavoidable.

    With this post, you do great service to womankind. I'm due for a mammogram, myself, and, thanks to you, I won't be able to get through it without giggling.

    ReplyDelete
  46. So good, so true, so well written. Thanks for a grin at your expense - I'll remember this next time I go (in a big truck, parked outside the local hospital, staffed by a grim -faced woman with a moustache last time!

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